


These Walls Are Paper Thin

by IamShadow21



Series: These Walls [1]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Captain America (Movies), Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Incredible Hulk (2008), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Anger, Avengers Tower, Canon Compliant, Captain America: The Winter Soldier Compliant, Character Study, Communication, Cooking, Coping, Deaf, Deaf Character, Deaf Clint, Deaf Clint Barton, Domestic Avengers, Drowning, Fanart, Food, Friendship, Gen, Gen Work, Hearing aids, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Injury Recovery, Iron Man 3 Compliant, Marvel Universe Big Bang, Marvel Universe Big Bang 2014, Meditation, Mind Control Aftermath & Recovery, Moving In Together, Multiple Personalities, Multiple Selves, Multiplicity/Plurality, Pancakes, Past Child Abuse, Past Domestic Violence, Past Relationship(s), Post-Avengers (2012), Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., Recovery, SHIELD, Science, Science Boyfriends, Science Bros, Skype, Social Anxiety, System Management, Team Bonding, Team as Family, Teambuilding, Thor: The Dark World Compliant
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-20
Updated: 2014-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-21 21:55:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,534
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2483765
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IamShadow21/pseuds/IamShadow21
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When most people think of Bruce Banner and The Hulk, they think of it as an either/or situation and assume that it's easy to tell who they're face to face with.</p><p>Most people are wrong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	These Walls Are Paper Thin

**Author's Note:**

> Beta by the amazing and ever-supportive tree00faery.
> 
> Fanart by my partner, kath_ballantyne, who was as eager to read this story as I was to write it, and who made so many wonderful works for it from the day I started writing up until yesterday. This is as much her labour of love as mine, so please, if you like the art, click through on a picture or click through to part two of the series to leave her kudos or comments.
> 
> I wrote this back in June, and I am SO EXCITED to be able to publish it. Five months is a really long time to wait.
> 
> This was in no small way influenced by watching Earth's Mightiest Heroes and seeing how the creators showed the dynamic between Bruce and the Hulk. It's made clear that it's not just angry green Bruce - the Hulk is a character in his own right, to the point where they occasionally have conversations. It made me think a lot about the Marvel Cinematic Universe and about Bruce and the Hulk's journey in it, from The Incredible Hulk through to The Avengers (and his post-credits cameo in IM3), and this story was born.

**Bruce**  
Bruce isn't certain what to expect when the dust settles. Arguably, he's been part of a team that saved the world, but he suspects that when the last of the Chitauri corpses have been hauled away, a hell of a lot of people with holes in their buildings the size of the Hulk are going to come out of the woodwork, pissed, expecting reparation. 

Even though this is New York, Bruce knows that insurance organisations hate having to pay out for collateral damage caused by superheroes. While it could be said that Thor and Iron Man did a comparable amount of smashing to him, most people seem to forget to be anything other than mildly besotted with Thor when confronted with him, and Tony Stark has an army of lawyers he keeps penned and salivating for working the aftermath of destruction on this scale. Bruce supposes that when you can throw enough money at people to make them happy, you're liable to be less concerned about just how many miles of Manhattan road have to be resurfaced as a direct result of something you did. 

For these and many other small reasons, Bruce is under no illusions - he knows he’ll be the first of them to be thrown under the bus. The Hulk has nothing but a rap sheet and a bad attitude to recommend him with the sweetener of having levelled a whole other part of New York only a few short years ago. People aren't just going to be annoyed, they're going to be baying for blood. 

“I'd ask if I'm free to leave, but I think we both know that's a bit of a joke,” Bruce says and Fury cracks a small smile. 

“I'm advising you to remain under the purview of SHIELD or take Stark up on his offer,” Fury says, though the latter half of the sentence is coloured with a hint of disdain. “If you're staying in the United States, those are the places where I can more or less guarantee you won't be bothered. If you strike out on your own or leave the country... well, let's just say our ability to guard you from certain parties would be limited.”

Fury doesn't say General Ross's name. He doesn't have to.

“Well, as lovely and welcome as you've made me feel,” Bruce says, “I think I'm going to take my chances with Tony.” He's the one who hasn't tried to build a cage to hold him, the one who'd probably let him run if he wanted to, though he's certain Tony would find a way to nag him incessantly until he returned.

“Very well,” Fury says with a grimace but the handshake he offers Bruce is firm and sincere. It's nice. Bruce still doesn't trust a word Fury says until he's seen Fury's Quinjet vanish into the blue of the sky.

Thor and Loki go home, Natasha gives Bruce the bag full of his meagre possessions, and instead of being arrested, Bruce climbs into a sports car with Tony like it's the beginning of a buddy road trip movie. It's more than a little surreal, even when compared to the events of the last three days.

So many roads are still blocked with rubble or closed off by emergency services that it takes a lot longer than usual to drive the relatively short distance from Central Park to Stark Tower. The whole time, Tony talks a mile a minute about projected changes to the Tower, about individual floors and training courses and dozens of labs. They park down deep under the Tower's roots and take a private elevator that feels like it's shooting them into space.

“Home sweet home. Mi casa and all that,” Tony says casually, strolling over to the still-intact section of the bar.

The penthouse is a disordered clutter of rubble and plastic sheeting. Here and there a pocket of undisturbed splendour remains but that only highlights that for the most part, it's an utter mess.

“I can understand why you're redecorating,” Bruce says. “I guess starting over was the best policy.” He looks down at the cracked and cratered slate and fits his shoe inside a giant footprint.

“Meh, I was getting bored of it anyhow,” Tony says, pouring himself a drink. His eyes are a little distant and Bruce doesn't miss the subtle tremble in his hands. “I've got a floor picked out just for you. It's already wired for R&D, so setting up your lab will be a snap. It's kinda got a hole in the south facing side but we'll get that fixed up, it's no big deal.” 

“I don't need a whole floor, Tony,” Bruce says but Tony ignores him.

“For now, there's a guest room over to your right. Take it, make it yours, take a nap, write on the walls, whatever floats your boat. It's all going to get remodelled anyway, so it really doesn't matter.”

“I broke your home,” Bruce says, shifting uncomfortably.

Tony flaps his hand, the one that isn't clinging to the tumbler like it's a life preserver. “I've got dozens of homes and I smash up at least one of them every year. Ask Pepper or Natasha about my birthday party the other year, they'll tell you all about it. This isn't even my only house in New York. Actually, I should probably check that the mansion's still standing,” Tony says then abruptly leaves, presumably to do just that.

Bruce waits around in the breezy, broken space for about ten minutes before shuffling off to find the room Tony mentioned. Far from being the simple bed and four walls he expected, it's a whole suite, complete with a kitchen, bathroom and living area. It's intact, unlike the outer room, and with a towel shoved under the door, there's not even a draught to bother him.

As cells go, it's pretty luxurious.

*

Tony's pattern of 'there one minute, gone the next' continues. He turns up the next day as if he'd never left, shows Bruce around the undamaged parts of the labs, and reveals the enormous, empty floor (complete with hole) that he's earmarked just for Bruce.

“I really don't need a whole floor,” Bruce argues.

“You say that now but particle accelerators take up a lot of space,” Tony says.

“I don't need a particle accelerator,” Bruce says.

Tony smirks at Bruce. “ _Everyone_ needs a particle accelerator,” he insists.

They eat lunch. It's a decadent spread of experimental finger food cooked by a Michelin star chef Bruce has never even heard of. Tony initially delights in Bruce's expressions of surprise at each new, weird but delicious thing he tastes, but without warning Tony's mood takes a sudden dive. By the time they've finished, he's barely said two words together for ten minutes. He fiddles with his phone for a moment or two then stands abruptly. 

“I'm going to Malibu, I'll be back soon. I've given you access to this floor, your floor, all of the labs and all of the cars. There's a black AmEx with your name on it ready for you with my PA, she'll bring it round for you in the morning. Buy yourself something pretty and, y'know, whatever else you need,” Tony says as he walks out.

Tony's gone for a month and a half.

Bruce is used to being on his own, to being lonely in foreign places, but being alone in Tony's tower is something new. He acclimatises pretty quickly, all things considered. The penthouse slowly reforms into something out of a magazine as craftspeople and tradesmen come and go, replacing floors and glass, swapping broken furniture out for undamaged pieces, wiring up fixtures and painting over the scars.

The Manhattan skyline changes too, scaffolding creeping up the sides of some buildings, while other, more wounded structures, are detonated. He watches the first couple of implosions, as do the public and the news crews. Eventually, though, the novelty palls and which buildings are detonated on any given day becomes a footnote to the headlines. Bruce stops watching, too. He just asks JARVIS to give him prior warning of demolitions so that he's prepared for the blast. He doesn't want to risk a transformation when for the moment, he's actually being left alone.

The hole in the floor where Loki lay isn't covered up at all. It's filled with cement and buffed to a shine. The date of the Battle of New York is carefully written in the very bottom, as if with a fingertip, and the numbers have been filled with some kind of gold metal to bring it up to the level of the surrounding cement. Bruce thinks he recognises Tony's work but Bruce never saw him arrive or leave, just saw the filled hole one morning when he rose and left his room.

*

He writes to Betty one day, because he knows that she would have seen his face on the television and that she would have worried had he not made contact. He tries to make it as matter-of-fact and friendly as he can without letting his feelings interfere but he's certain some of the longing inside slips though the cracks.

She writes back and it all culminates in a Skype conversation conducted in shy murmurs. 

“You've gone grey,” Betty says. Bruce's hair was getting long, so he buzzed it close to his head and it seems all that's left are grey and silver threads tangled with dark steel. “It suits you.”

“You look just the same,” Bruce says and it's mostly truth. Her hair is styled a little differently. Her laugh and frown lines are deeper, as though someone has drawn them with a firmer hand than he was expecting. Her smile is still enough to warm him thoroughly.

They talk about safe things; old times, the Battle, Betty's latest project. They don't talk about the chemistry that still exists between them, about the ring on Betty's finger, about the dark spectre of Betty's father who still hunts Bruce with the obsession and madness of Captain Ahab.

By the time they sign off, Bruce has given Betty the details for the card Tony gave him for expenses and the Tower's address so that she can send on whatever detritus she kept from his life before, whatever the Army and her father didn't ransack, steal or destroy.

“I love you,” Betty says unhesitatingly. “Stay safe.”

“I will,” Bruce says and the screen goes dark. 

“I love you, too,” he says to the empty air.

*

Tony flits in and out of his life half a dozen times over the next few months, never announcing his arrival or his departure. Sometimes he's only there for a handful of hours; one memorable time, he's there for two weeks. They make something blow up rather more spectacularly than planned and the entire building gets evacuated past the end of the block for at least three hours. Tony laughs about it the whole time, like he's barely holding it together.

“I told you once that I was exposed, like a nerve,” Bruce says when they're back inside, out of the rain. “You look like that right now.” 

Tony's hands shake, his eyes are hollow and wild, he barely eats and Bruce has no idea if he sleeps at all. He looks like something is hunting him, something with fangs and claws and foetid breath. Bruce has up close and personal experience with what an imminent collapse looks like and he's certain Tony's powering towards one with every cylinder he's got.

Tony's eyes flick away, refuse to meet his. “I'm working on it,” he says eventually. 

An hour later, he's gone again.

*

Bruce sits out Tony's death and resurrection in a SHIELD holding cell. The moment the Malibu house is attacked, Fury himself turns up to take him in. 

“The Tower's the next likely target,” Fury says tersely. “And, no offence, but we don't need The Hulk making a mess of Manhattan just after we got it cleaned up nice.”

Bruce doesn't think his door is actually locked but he doesn't bother to test it. He eats the meals they give him, is polite to the SHIELD agents that guard him, and covers his walls with complex equations since there are no whiteboards available and no JARVIS to project them in light.

“Is that chemistry?” one guard asks, squinting at them.

“Yes,” Bruce says. “You like science?”

“Naturally,” she says with a wry smile, “but this is way above my head. You should visit the geeks down the hall.”

When Bruce looks blank, she clarifies, “There's a whole wing of labs just around the corner. I'm pretty sure you have clearance but I can check.”

“Thanks,” Bruce says, stunned.

“No problem,” she says.

The next day she leads him round a corner and down a long hallway, through three sets of security doors and into a large maze of labs filled with SHIELD's best and brightest.

“Doctor Banner, it is _such_ an honour, we are _so_ excited to have you here,” enthuses a petite English girl with the name Simmons embroidered on her labcoat.

“Really, truly honoured,” says a Scottish boy labelled Fitz, who shakes his hand with a firm grip.

“The pleasure's mine,” Bruce says politely, a little overwhelmed by the look of awe in their eyes. It's been a long time since he's had anything like it directed his way. “This is a great set-up you've got here. Very impressive.”

“I don't suppose it would be possible, while you're here, to get just a _teeny_ sample of your blood for analysis?” Simmons asks, tentative and eager all at once.

 _And there it is._ He grimaces. “No blood, sorry,” he says as gently as he can but the bright young things still droop a little in disappointment. “That never works out well for anyone, in my experience. I was just hoping that maybe you had an out-of-the-way corner I could work in?”

Fitz and Simmons perk up a bit again.

“We've got just the place,” Fitz says.

“Follow me,” Simmons says and Bruce can't help but smile as he does.

*

“Frankly, I'm hurt,” Tony says when he shuffles in four months later, his usual frenetic energy dimmed by recovery. He's leaning on a gold and red striped cane that Bruce suspects has a tiny Iron Man helmet as the knob on top. “I thought we had a good thing going. Science bros, and all that. I turn my back and you cheat on me with SHIELD?”

“You taunted a terrorist, died, became a vigilante, burned all your suits, then underwent complicated heart surgery,” Bruce says.

“I know, I didn't call, I didn't write, my bad,” Tony says. He doesn't look that apologetic but a lot of the shadows seem to be gone from behind his eyes, so Bruce is willing to give him a bit of leeway.

“I only knew you weren't dead because Pepper thought to call me and then I saw footage of you on CNN,” Bruce says, because he's still a little pissed.

“So you go and play with the spooks? That's harsh,” Tony says. “I bet they're not half as fun as me.”

“They're not bad,” Bruce says, thinking of Fitz and Simmons. 

His chemistry project hadn't panned out the way he'd wanted it to – as an emergency chemical restraint for The Hulk – but Fitz and Simmons seem galvanised by the potential for the use of at least one of the derivatives as an instantaneous non-lethal sedative. They've been brainstorming the best way to deliver the dose for the last week, developing designs for just about everything from a standard looking tranq dart through to some kind of pellet that breaks up transdermally without leaving an entry wound. Their excitement's equal parts endearing and dizzying, their synchronised leaps of inspiration and creativity something to be envied. It reminds him of nothing so much as the dynamic he'd had with Betty, of the one he could potentially have with Tony, if Tony stayed put for more than a minute at a time.

“Anyway, you have to come home, because all the corporate levels are ship-shape again, which means your floor is up. And if you don't come home with me, I'll design it myself, which means it's going to be filled with cars, welding equipment and a bitchin' stereo system,” Tony threatens.

“How could I refuse?” Bruce says, because he knows it's the best way to make Tony's pale face light up.

 **Thor**  
It's a long flight from England to America, even by his standards, but still far swifter using his hammer than it would be in one of Midgard's flying craft. Jane informed him before he left that that was not even an option, that the government of America had grounded all the machines and patrolled their skies for intruders. 

“It was like this after 9/11, too,” Jane says then flaps a hand when she realises he has failed to recognise the context of her comparison. “Go, just go,” she says, standing up high on her toes to kiss him, her hands pressed against his chest. “Stay safe, and call me, when you can.”

Thor appreciates America's vigilance, even as he must take an erratic pattern to avoid falling foul of their sweeps.

“Please wait to be validated,” a cool, electronic voice states. 

Thor waits outside for long enough to start having impatient thoughts about smashing his way in before he hears Tony's voice, tired and tinny, “Oh, for Christ's sake, JARVIS, he's an alien, he's not going to be a secret Nazi,” and the locks disengage.

He steps inside and Tony is nowhere to be seen. There's nobody there, in fact, except for Doctor Banner, sitting on the sofa in front of the television.

“Hey,” Banner says. “You missed the party.”

Thor looks at the cataclysm spooling out in replays on the giant screen, the Helicarriers dooming each other to self-destruction.

“Should we not help?” he asks, appalled at what must have been a shocking loss of life and not far from here. Banner's casual sarcasm seems callous.

“And do what?” Banner asks, turning to look at Thor. His face is tight and coloured an unhealthy tint, his eyes a murky hazel. “Smash something to bits that hasn't already been broken? I think SHIELD have got it covered. Hey, I saw your work in Greenwich, by the way. Great job. I couldn't have done better myself,” Bruce says and his smile is bitter. 

“Your anger, I think, is not intended for me,” Thor says slowly.

“You're probably right, but you're here and I think you can take it,” Bruce spits. His fist curls into the fabric of the sofa and it creaks audibly with the strain. “Have a seat,” Bruce offers a moment later. “This Tower's still my cage, but it's not a bad place to sit to watch the world burn.”

On the screen, a wounded Helicarrier again begins its slow dive, shearing a large building in two. Thor sits.

“Do you have comrades in that conflagration?” Thor asks solemnly.

“A few,” Bruce admits, looking down at his hand. Rather than unclenching it, he fists it tighter. “Fury's dead,” Bruce says and Thor sucks in a breath. “Steve's in the hospital, he was part of the battle. Natasha got shot, but seems to be okay. Tony didn't fight but he got in his jet first thing and flew to DC as soon as they opened up the airspace enough for him to land. I think he still had to drive most of the way, the capital’s locked down. As for the others,” Bruce says, finally loosening his grip, “I really just don't know. There were these kids in the Sci-Tech Division, they got reassigned about six months back. Something secret. I don't know if they're Hydra, or if they're lying somewhere in all that,” he gestures at the screen.

“They could yet live and not be traitors,” Thor suggests quietly.

“They weren't soldiers, they were basically children,” Bruce says, shaking his head. “If they were there, or anywhere else Hydra had a foothold, they're dead.”

“Perhaps you mourn too soon, but if you do not, then I am sorry for your loss,” Thor says and Bruce's throat flexes in a hard swallow.

“Did you come all the way from Asgard just to watch us fall on our own sword?” Bruce asks when he gathers back his composure.

“Nay,” Thor says with a shake of his head. “London. I am biding with Jane for a time. We are 'shacking up', I believe it is called.”

Bruce snorts then drops back into seriousness like a stone. “Is she _safe?_ ” he asks urgently.

“Jane never trusted SHIELD,” Thor assures him. “She has remained apart from them since the Battle. I believe whatever misfortune has fallen upon them will not harm her.”

Bruce nods. Together, they watch two Helicarriers collide in mid-air in slow motion, tangling together and falling to land in the water of the Potomac. 

“What happened in London, was it Loki?” Bruce asks.

Thor is quiet for a moment, lets the pain fill him up, then breathes it out. “It was not, though he was a part of things,” he says.

“I can't say I'm surprised,” Bruce says.

“He came to my aid, to save Jane and all of the Nine Realms from destruction,” Thor adds.

“Well, that _is_ a surprise,” Bruce says.

“He is dead,” Thor says after a long pause.

Bruce nods, digesting the information. “Good,” he says finally and turns back to the screen without another word.

Thor supposes that Bruce's honesty is worth more than platitudes, despite how the sentiment wounds him.

Though he came prepared for action, Thor finds himself sitting beside Bruce for a long time, watching, caught in the web of rolling coverage as the Insight ships fall again and again, leaving the world without even a critically flawed protector to shield it.

 **Steve**  
Steve's hunt has ranged far and wide, from America to Europe to Russia and South-East Asia and the Middle East. He's travelled nearly as much in the last few months as he did during the war. He's seen a lot of places, fought a lot of people trying to kill him. He's walked through Hydra facilities both new and old, intact and ruined. Some had been laid waste to during the war, often by him, personally. Others, the stink of char still hangs over them. One is actually ablaze when he arrives, local fire authorities trying desperately to extinguish it. The flames are an unusual hue and rage so hot they can't get close enough to use their hoses. It takes three days for it to burn itself out and by the time Steve can get near it, nothing is left but the foundations, the cement turned to chalky powder by the intense heat. There are no answers and no signs of Bucky, recent or otherwise.

He's pretty invulnerable, by human standards, but even Steve has to concede that he's tired. When Sam suggests they take a break, Steve's ashamed at how relieved he feels, how readily he agrees.

“Soldiers get leave,” Sam says, fixing Steve with a sharp eye. “Have you even stopped since New York?”

“I've had plenty of days off,” Steve tries to argue.

“I know Fury had you on-call at all hours, drop everything, when you were working with the strike team for SHIELD. That's not the same as leave and you know it. You can't rest if you're waiting by the phone,” Sam says firmly. “Take a month. Sleep. It'll give you fresh legs and a clearer perspective.”

His apartment in DC was so compromised it was a joke, so he'd long ago moved his surviving possessions into storage. Tony had offered Steve a place in the Tower a day or two after the Battle, what seems a hundred years ago. After three days back stateside, he's just about had enough of sleeping on Sam's couch, so he sends Stark a tentative text message accepting the offer.

The next day, a truck with Stark Industries logos arrives outside Sam's house right as they're getting back from their morning run. An hour later, all of Steve's things from Sam's house and the storage locker are in the back of it and Steve is sat in the front between the two movers, awkwardly apologising for his shoulder width. 

“You kidding?” the woman in the passenger seat says. Her name is Leilani. She's got dark skin and a beautiful mix of Polynesian and Japanese features that he thinks he recognises from a layover in Hawai'i during the war. She also somehow lifted his oak dining table unassisted, which won his unadulterated admiration. “My kids are going to be so excited. Lino, take a picture of us.”

Steve obediently grins for the photo and then they're on their way.

When the truck arrives at the Tower, they pull into a loading bay for a spacious basement workshop filled with scrap metal, twisted chassis, machines that appear to have been cannibalised for parts, and one Tony Stark, looking grim. He’s holding a wand like the kind Steve's seen in the hands of airport security. If it also looks a little like the stun rods the strike team used on him, he doesn't let himself flinch.

“I apologise in advance for the blatant disregard for any semblance of privacy, Cap, but every single thing that came from that apartment, including you, is getting scanned. I'm not letting Hydra through my doors.” There's a mulish, confrontational twist to his lips that Steve recognises from that day on the Helicarrier when Tony was going right up on his toes so that he could challenge Steve to a fight, eye to eye.

When Steve just shrugs and says, “Fine by me,” he thinks it takes the wind out of Tony's sails just a little, even though he recovers quickly.

Weeding through his possessions takes time. Tony is methodical and ruthless, going over every inch, over every tiny thing, from Steve's coffee table down to his underwear. Steve'd be inclined to think that Tony was deliberately being annoying were it not for the steadily growing pile of things on the 'bugged' pile including but not limited to Steve's motorcycle, his toaster oven, a rug that used to lie next to his bed, and Steve's favourite, most comfortable leather jacket.

“Some of these, you'll be able to get the trackers and recorders out of them,” Tony says as he sets Steve's antique pencil box over in the 'bugged' pile. Steve tries to school his woeful expression back to nonchalance but from Tony's empathetic grimace, he suspects he fails. “Others, it's probably more trouble than they're worth. Anything electronic, we're probably better off incinerating and getting new, rather than risking it.”

“What about my record player? I just got it fixed,” Steve asks, plaintively.

Tony shrugs. “If you're attached, sure. I'll take a look. They're pretty simple inside, and JARVIS should be able to catch anything I miss. And if I have to gut it, I can rebuild it for you.” 

“They're hard to find, working,” Steve says.

“I had to fix mine the other month. Workshop accident,” Tony adds when he catches Steve's look of surprise.

“I woulda thought they'd be too old-fashioned for you. I thought you'd have one of those iPod things,” Steve says.

“Some things sound better on vinyl. And yes, that makes me sound like a painful hipster but frankly, I don't care,” Tony says, setting the record player down on a separate table from the other electronics.

“I guess if you fixed your own player then you know what you're doing,” Steve says, more relaxed.

“Well, when I say 'fixed', it's more like 'recreated'. And Pepper keeps telling me that the deliberate destruction of my house by missiles as a direct result of me taunting a terrorist doesn't count as a workshop accident,” Tony admits, honing in on Steve's mattress with a look of intense mistrust.

When the scanner beeps almost immediately, Steve kind of wishes he could drink.

*

He guesses it's because over the preceding few days he's become so used to Tony's chaotic, loud, noisy workspace, half high-tech blueprints made of light, half grease-smeared engineering shop, that Bruce's lab is such a shock. 

It's clean but full of clutter. One wall is dedicated to shelves packed with beat up text-books and science journals. Another holds a glass-fronted, backlit cabinet with neat rows of bottles, jars, and specialised glassware. There's a bench with an inlaid sink and gas fixtures that is obviously meant for scientific experimentation, and another with a holographic screen and keyboard that shows Tony's hand in creating the space tucked into a corner. 

Tony hasn't had absolute creative control over the set-up, though, because there's also a large whiteboard completely covered in scrawled equations that Steve knows he hasn't a hope of deciphering without going to college first. By the bookshelf stands a wingback chair that looks like it'd be more at home in Steve's era than the twenty-first century with a lamp spilling a warm pool of light on its empty seat. There's a half-drunk cup of tea on the edge of a shelf and at least two more that Steve can count in other places. And there's the man himself, Bruce, who looks rather like he's just tumbled out of bed or slept in the chair and then just continued working on whatever's caught his focus. That, at least, he shares in common with Tony, when he's outside the public eye.

“Looks like you've got yourself pretty well settled in,” Steve says. If he couldn't still smell the faint odour of fresh paint, he'd think Bruce had lived here for years.

“A lot of baggage for a homeless guy, right?” Bruce says, amused. “Betty, she, ah... She kept a lot of my things. She sent them on when she heard I'd found somewhere a bit more permanent.”

“Betty's your girl?” Steve asks.

“She was, a long, long time ago. Before all... this,” Bruce says, gesturing at himself. “To be honest, I think she was probably just relieved to get this stuff out of her garage. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure she's happy for me but I think she's more than likely happier to close that chapter of her life all together. She's moved on and I don't like to think that I might be stopping her from living.”

Steve thinks of Peggy, lying frail in a hospital bed with the evidence of her long life on the table beside her, of her forgetting and then crying, 'It's been _so long_ ,' and cracking his heart anew. There isn't an ounce of him that'd have Peggy pining after him, forever alone, and yet, his mind can't help but rush ahead and think of all the moments they'd missed, all the never-will-be's that could have been had he survived the war. Steve's willing to bet Bruce has his own collection, a set of hopeless fantasies where he and Betty never parted ways.

“The guy she's with, he loves her. Really loves her, for who she is,” Bruce continues. “And with me out of the picture, with these things out of her space, maybe she'll have some closure and can love him, too.” He scrubs a hand through his hair. “That's the noble thing to want, anyway, right?”

“What do you really want?” Steve can't help but ask.

“What I want doesn't matter, since I very rarely get it. Right now, everything I want, that's within my reach, is in this room,” he says, gesturing around him. “Tony wanted to give me the whole floor. I didn't want that. So he's just left the other spaces vacant, hoping I'll change my mind.”

“That likely?” Steve asks.

“I don't know yet. I'll see what I feel like when I've gotten used to having roots again. The books are helping,” he says, waving a hand at the shelves. “I haven't had more than half a dozen at a time since I went on the run and every time I had to leave, stuff like that didn't come with me. The Other Guy never bothered packing,” Bruce says with a smile. “Now, what can I do for you? From the lack of urgency I'm guessing you're not here for the Other Guy. Generally there's more yelling and rolling news coverage.” He gestures to a tiny CRT television serving as much as a bookend as a form of entertainment. The sound is turned down but there's a troupe of colourful puppets bouncing on the screen. 

“My apartment was kinda getting to me. It's...” Steve trails off.

“Extravagant? Gaudy? Terrifyingly new millennium?” Bruce prompts.

“Enormous. And kinda empty. The stuff I brought with me from DC takes up about a quarter of the square footage,” Steve says. “And it seems disrespectful to feel it but I just want my old place back. Minus the bullet holes and SHIELD surveillance, of course. And I know we're hundreds of feet up, but what's wrong with solid walls? I feel like I'm sleeping on a balcony.”

“Tony likes his open spaces,” Bruce says with a fond smile. “I'd say it was due to being forcibly kept in a cave in the dark for three months but I saw a spread on his Malibu house in an architecture and design magazine once and it wasn't much different.”

“He showed me around it personally,” Steve says a little desperately. “He was insulting, completely rude and dismissive and didn't shut up for a minute but I could tell how much he wanted me to like it. So I said I did.”

“And now you're stuck with it,” Bruce says.

Steve shrugs and scrubs the back of his head with one hand. “Yeah. This is nice, though. Cosy.”

“It's just things. But you don't realise how comforting things can be until you've made do without,” Bruce says.

“The war was like that. A lot of sleeping on the ground and eating out of tins and missing the apartment me and Bucky shared in Brooklyn. It was draughty in winter and the walls were paper thin but it had a roof, y'know?”

“And, presumably, fewer people shooting at you,” Bruce says.

“Well, depends on what the mob was up to. Neighbour of mine once had a picture shot right off her mantelpiece by a stray bullet from the alley below.”

“You make it all sound so lovely. It's a wonder you like the future at all,” Bruce says.

“Well, there's less cabbage in the future. I don't miss that,” Steve says.

“Remind me to get you to try kimchi next time we order Korean food,” Bruce says, smirking.

“I'm willing to be persuaded on cabbage if you think it's tasty but you're never going to make me like bedbugs,” Steve says mulishly. 

Bruce laughs and it's refreshingly light and free of cynicism. “No fear of that. I think they're completely devoid of redeeming features.”

“I kinda hoped the serum would make me less appealing but after Project Rebirth I seemed to get bit as much as the next fella,” Steve says ruefully.

“Advantage one and only to my condition; most things won't take a bite of me, now. It's like they know I'm toxic. After... I spent a lot of time in South America, India, places with a lot of insects and a lot of disease. I never got bit or got sick. Meant working as a doctor made a lot of sense. I had the basic skills, if not the official qualifications, and I never had to worry about catching anything or passing something on to anyone else.” Bruce slumps a little. “It's what we were aiming for, Betty and I and the rest of our team. A way to make humanity free from sickness, to make us stronger. And it worked,” he laughs, once, and it has a bitter edge. “It worked. And the cost was unthinkable.”

“You're a good man,” Steve says.

“I'm a unstable element with a very long list of people I've left bleeding or worse in my wake. I'm not exactly the kind of person you just sit around and shoot the breeze with,” Bruce says. He's jittery, now, hands skittering from one thing to another on his bench without real apparent purpose.

“Why not? We seemed to be doing just fine at that,” Steve says, wondering where he misstepped to make Bruce so uneasy.

“I guess I'm just confused about why you'd want to spend time with a guy like me. Most people are smart enough to keep their distance.”

“Except Tony.”

Bruce shrugs. “Yeah, well, the Other Guy is just one more lion's mouth for him to stick his head into. He used to make a living building bombs. He's spent his life running towards the explosions.” 

Steve's mouth twists into a rueful smile. “Me too. You'd think we'd get on better.”

“Actually, two guys who both go looking for a fight out of habit? You're destined to rub each other up the wrong way. Or the right way. You're both tinderboxes waiting for a spark.” Bruce turns so the curve of his back is to Steve, his shoulders hunched forward. “Me, I just always wanted to be left alone.”

“You've got a lot of anger in you for a guy who doesn't want to fight,” Steve observes.

“Don't you?”

“Yeah, I suppose I do. Bucky always said I was out to prove something, that wanting to sign up to fight in the war was just one more back alley brawl I was looking to win. I didn't want to hear it, of course, but he wasn't wrong.” Steve watches Bruce shuffle back and forth in front of his work station. His hands are busy, and Steve has no way of telling if Bruce is actually working now or just trying to make it look like he is. “What did you have to prove?” Steve asks.

Bruce stills for a few moments then lets one empty hand curl around the edge of the desk. “What any guy from a bad situation looks to prove, I guess. That he's more than the sum of his past. That a lotus can grow from the mud. I don't remember much of my childhood but the parts I do remember makes me think that maybe that's a good thing.”

“The serum, Erskine told me that it's about what's inside of you,” Steve says slowly. “That it takes it, makes you what you always were, but more.”

Bruce abandons any pretence at work and turns to face Steve properly. His hands curl around his upper arms, hugging himself in a way that seems halfway between self-comforting and defensive. “It did, but what was in me was too big, too chaotic to contain,” Bruce says, then taps on his temple with a fingertip. “He was already there. Maybe he was _always_ there, looking over my shoulder, and I just didn't know it. Anger was never an emotion I felt comfortable entertaining. I always had a temper, though whether you'd call it nature or nurture is up for debate. My father was a volatile mixture, and my mother or me or just about anything could be the catalyst to set that off. When things got bad, I used to go away somewhere, in my head. Somewhere quiet, dark. Safe. I guess I never really thought about who took my place while I was gone. He had to take a lot of pain for me, for years. And that anger, that rage that I thought it wasn't safe for me to feel? That I felt was dangerous for me and for those around me? I guess he took the burden of that from me, too.”

  
  
He was always there  
Art by kath_ballantyne. [Click HERE to leave her kudos!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2483831)

“Sounds lonely,” Steve can't help but say.

“It was. It is. One of my clearest memories of my mother is of cleaning blood off her face while my father is passed out drunk in the next room. And I feel nothing. Not rage, not hate. Not resignation. Just this detachment that allows me to perform this task. My hands are steady. They're steady now,” Bruce says, holding one out flat to demonstrate, “and yet he must have been so close behind me, pressed against my back, guiding me to wet the cloth, to wipe the evidence of violence from her skin, because he's close right now, so near that I can feel his breath on my neck.”

Bruce's eye contact, sketchy and passing up until this point, has become intense, unblinking. His eyes, usually a deep, bottomless brown, are emerald green.

“Can you see him?” Bruce asks, casually. His voice resonates with a slightly fuller bass register that Steve imagines he can feel vibrating in his ribcage.

“Yes,” Steve says, his voice hushed. He doesn't look away.

Bruce gives a shaky laugh, more a rush of breath, and the green fades back to darkness. When he speaks again, the deeper tone is gone.

“What the serum found in you, what it made you into, it's a fairy tale. It's beautiful,” Bruce says, waving an expressive hand. “What I did, what I became, it's a cautionary tale. It's hubris in action, a man brought low by his own inherent flaws, his own arrogance. What I feared the most wasn't being worthless or left behind, it was the darkness inside myself that I had buried so deeply I thought no one would ever find it, let alone myself. It gave that broken, hurt, angry little boy a voice and a powerful form for the first time. The conundrum being, _that little boy wasn't me_. It was him. And then I spent the best part of five years trying to get rid of him, trying to shove him back into the cupboard under the stairs in my brain. Not recognising, of course, that he had just as much right to be here as me. We're both products of that dreadful cradle. We're more alike than I care to dwell on, even now. He's a dark mirror showing me all the ways in which I've failed.” There's a smile on Bruce's lips, but it's a study in humourless self-mockery.

“You don't think we've all got that darkness within ourselves?” Steve asks.

“Perhaps. We're all atoning for something, I guess. Tony calls this a terrible privilege, what we are, what we do, and he's got a longer list of sins than me, destruction and death on a scale that even the Other Guy can't lay claim to. But whatever we do, however much we do it, it's never going to be enough, is it?” Bruce muses. He doesn't sound like he's expecting an answer.

“It has to be,” Steve says, because the alternative is too horrible to contemplate.

 **Clint**  
Natasha pulls Clint out of a dive bar in Mesquite and takes him back to New York. He's been hanging round there for three days, hustling a little pool, but never big enough stakes to upset anybody too badly. The last town, it was darts. The next, he was going to try his luck at cards.

“You really suck at undercover,” she murmurs. She's dressed cheap, like her time doesn't come for free and her rates are negotiable. Only Clint is close enough to smell her perfume, which is French, top shelf, and his particular favourite out of her entire collection, though he's never told her that aloud.

“I do all right,” he protests. Her hand is on his arm, drifting up to toy with the collar of his plaid shirt. He rests his own free hand, the one not holding the beer, low on her hip, suggestive of a claim being placed, possessive. It's a joke that they alone will get, because of all the people Clint's met in his life, he thinks Natasha is the only one who truly belongs only to herself and she's fought for every scrap of that autonomy too hard to ever give it up.

“You busted a twenty-year-old darts record thirty miles south of here,” Natasha counters, her eyes fond. “Idiot.”

The way she slides into his lap a moment or two later has someone down the other end of the bar wolf-whistling. When they leave together soon after, he knows they won't be missed.

They drive to New York, even though it's over two thousand miles. They change cars on a regular basis, dumping one and stealing another, never anything pricey or memorable, always disguised with a dummy set of plates that Natasha can change to whatever state and plate number she likes. Clint hasn't seen the tech before and he actually ventures a comment, breaking the silence he'd held out of apathy since they'd crossed yet another state line.

“SHIELD?” he asks.

“Stark,” Natasha says. 

They sleep overnight in motels, the kind that take cash and don't care enough to ask questions. They share a bed but they sleep curled around each other, chaste as children. Even with the uncomfortable mattresses, the thin walls and shitty air conditioning, it's the best he's slept in months.

When they cruise into Manhattan in a maroon Pontiac, Clint keeps his eyes shut, feigning sleep, until he feels the car dip down into the cool, underground expanse of a parking garage. They take their gear from the trunk, methodically sanitise the car of all traces of themselves, and walk away, leaving it unlocked. It's a further two blocks on foot and Clint can no longer use the excuse of a nap to look away from the marks on the city, from what he had a hand, however unwilling, in wreaking. He stares down at his feet, instead.

Once they're actually inside, Natasha hangs around long enough for him to dump his pack in the corner and unlace his boots and then she says she's leaving.

Clint blinks at her. “What?”

“You need to be around people right now, so don't even think of following me. Your covers are burned and that scruff wouldn't have kept the people who hate you off your back forever,” she says with a soft smile behind her eyes. She reaches out and runs a gentle finger along the beard on Clint's jawline. “Lie low here for a while. Spend Stark's money. Learn how to trust someone besides me again.”

“Like you trust anyone else but me,” he scoffs.

Natasha's lips turn up into an actual smile. “I do, now, actually,” she says. “You should try it. It's not so bad.”

She leaves him with his pack and his boots and an enormous apartment that has a ridiculous etched outline of a bow on the front door in stainless steel. He spends his first evening changing that. About twenty minutes' work and a couple of permanent markers dulls the metal down to the same black as the door, and some tape and scissors and scrap paper makes a nice stencil for him to cover over with some lilac spray paint he just happens to have in his pack. The result is messy and would look more at home in an alley than at the top of Stark's mansion in the sky, but the doing of it feels significant and, more importantly, it gives him something to do with his hands during those first few hours when running away is all he can think about. 

Sleep is another hurdle. His apartment is like the presidential suite at a fancy hotel. He's only ever been in one of those for a mission or for a job, before he joined up with SHIELD. Sleeping in one is the opposite to his instincts and he's getting hungry, so he ventures out to the elevator and gets JARVIS to take him up to the communal floor Natasha mentioned.

It's no less ostentatious but it at least feels a little more lived in. The refrigerator is full of food but most of it is fresh stuff, whole vegetables that he's only got the barest clue what to do with. So, that's how he winds up making himself a stack of sandwiches and sitting down in front of the Food Network, with the sound turned off and the closed captions on.

He's kind of engrossed, watching a chef do something to something with tentacles, so he doesn't realise he's not alone until he sees an odd reflection in the screen. He's up into a defensive crouch in a moment, breathing hard, every nerve jangling. The knife he hasn't been without since New York, even in the shower, is in his hand, though he has no memory of drawing it.

It's Bruce, it's just Bruce. His hands are up, palms outward, and his mouth is twitched into an apologetic half-smile. _Sorry_ , Clint sees his lips shape and form. _I wasn't trying to be quiet._

It still takes a few moments for him to convince his body to stand down from full alert. He forces himself to at least sheathe the knife. He'd rather not provoke The Hulk into making an appearance; he's had a very long day already. 

“I took my hearing aids out,” Clint explains, feeling the words buzz in his throat, hearing the muffled boom of them in his ears. “They were itching me.”

“I suppose that means wearing a bell around my neck wouldn't help,” Bruce says.

Clint laughs and relaxes completely. “It might, depending on the tone and how loudly you were ringing it.”

“Good to know, I'll look into that,” Bruce says. “So, are you reading my lips?”

“Right now? Yeah. When I'm wearing the hearing aids, most of the time I'm okay to actually hear you, as long as I'm looking at you. If I'm facing away, then I don't always know when people are speaking to me. It's just sort of a generalised buzz of noise. They amplify sound but they don't discriminate well between useful sound and junk.”

Bruce nods. “Good to know. Mind if I join you?” he asks, gesturing at the sofa.

“Sure. Can't sleep either?” Clint asks.

Bruce shrugs. “I wasn't trying to sleep, but the project I was working on was being... difficult, and I needed to walk away from it for a while.”

“Want a sandwich? I made loads, and I know I always get cranky when I'm hungry,” Clint says with a smile.

“Thanks, that'd be great,” Bruce says, walking around to grab a sandwich and sit.

Clint digs in his pocket, pulls out his hearing aids and slips them in.

“You don't have to do that on my account,” Bruce says, his voice suddenly resonating in Clint's ears when he flicks them on.

“Nah, it's easier,” Clint says, picking up the sandwich he'd dropped when Bruce appeared. “And with the sound off on that,” he nods at the television, “I've only got one source of noise to decipher, and that's you. It's less work than trying to read the captions and you having to get my attention every time you want to say something.”

“Do they put captions on everything?” Bruce asks.

“A lot of things,” Clint says with a nod. “Some places overseas, like Great Britain, you can get a sign interpreter in the corner of the screen, too.”

“That's pretty awesome,” Bruce agrees.

“Yeah, it would be, if I knew BSL. The Brits may speak English like us but their sign language is completely different. I don't sign much, so I'm rusty enough with my ASL without trying to pick up another language. Maybe if I relied on it, if my residual hearing was worse and the hearing aids helped less, I'd be more motivated to learn.”

“Never too late to learn,” Bruce says.

They both chew on their sandwiches while they watch the chef plate up the squid with an artistry even Clint can appreciate the aesthetics of.

“I think I'd rather learn to cook,” Clint says.

“You seem like a pretty self-reliant guy,” Bruce says. “No one ever taught you?”

Clint shakes his head. “I went from shitty home to shitty foster homes, to group homes, to the circus, to a fairly shady illegal portion of my life, and finally, to SHIELD, where the cuisine varied between cafeteria food and MRE's,” Clint says. “Sandwiches and calling out for pizza are about the high points of my skills.”

“I did the whole shitty home to foster home thing, too,” Bruce says. “I lived with my aunt for a while but she was kind of suspicious any time I set foot in the kitchen for something other than a glass of water. It was her space. And then when I went to college, I did what every college kid does and lived on ramen. I guess I never really grew out of that.” Bruce shrugs, reaches forward and snags another sandwich. “When I got tenure, when I got the contract to do the gamma experiments, I was making enough that any time Betty and I were miraculously awake, not working, and hungry at the same time, I'd take her out for Italian. There was this great little family restaurant, this guy who ran it, he was always trying to feed us up. It was nice,” he says wistfully.

“Sounds it,” Clint says. 

“When I was on the run, I didn't do much other than open a can of beans for myself. I ate a lot of street food. Most of the places I stayed, when I had a place, weren't more than a mattress and a roof. They didn't tend to have a kitchen, let alone something like this,” Bruce says, gesturing at the enormous kitchen behind them. It's got a full industrial set up and it's more like something out of one of the cooking shows on the Food Network than something Clint's ever seen in anyone's actual home. 

“Street food's pretty awesome,” Clint agrees.

They spend the next half hour comparing experiences from several continents. He's surprised at how often their travels intersected, how many favourite dishes they share. Bruce has never been to Africa but he listens intently to Clint's praise for meals from half a dozen countries. Clint's never been to Peru but Bruce has seven different recommendations for two cities alone. 

They polish off the sandwiches without difficulty and by the time Clint's eyes are drooping, he realises he hasn't thought about running in over an hour. He says good night to Bruce and takes the elevator back down to his apartment. The target on the door is enough to curve his lips into a smile and the enormous bed is decidedly more comfortable than the bony motel mattresses he'd called his own for the last few months, so sleep comes more easily than he expects it to.

*

“What are you doing?” Tony asks, staring at Clint like he's performing some strange and arcane ritual.

“What does it look like I'm doing?” Clint throws back.

“It looks like you're cooking. You know, I have people for that. And money, lots of money. You want a five star chef to make you lunch? One phone call,” Tony waggles his phone. “Unless this is apology food,” Tony says, looking thoughtful. “What'd you break?”

“Nothing,” Clint says, although that's technically a lie. He doesn't think that thingumy in his apartment was important, anyway. “And it's not for you.”

“I used to do this thing where I tried to give food to Pepper when I messed up. One time I made omelettes. It was... not my finest moment,” Tony confesses. 

Clint sniggers.

“What the hell is that, even?” Tony says, picking up an item and waving it.

“Ginger,” Clint says. He snatches the knobbly root back from Tony's grasp.

“Huh. I thought ginger was pink,” Tony says, squinting at it.

“You've only ever had it on fancy sushi, haven't you,” Clint says with certainty.

“Yep,” Tony admits. “Anyway, enjoy your futile pursuit, JARVIS knows all the numbers for the best places that will deliver actual food to Stark Tower. I'm gonna be in DC all week. Ciao.”

“Asshole,” Clint shouts after him.

Half an hour and two Bandaids later, Clint's got a growing pile of chopped up stuff and he's frowning hard at his tablet, trying to decipher recipe lingo to work out what to do next.

“Hey,” Bruce says. He looks tired enough to fall asleep standing up, but he's smiling at Clint, warm and easy. “Smells good.”

“Haven't even started yet,” Clint grouses. “I wanted to make this Thai thing I had ages ago. I found a recipe, but I have no idea what I'm doing.” He gives the tablet another poke.

“Well, that's a pretty good line-up,” Bruce says, looking at the variety of vegetables in piles on the chopping board. “I think so long as we don't burn it or make it too salty, it should come out okay.”

“You offering to help?” Clint asks.

“Well, I'm here. And if it all goes horribly wrong, I can help you put out the fire.”

  
  
Cooking  
Art by kath_ballantyne. [Click HERE to leave her kudos!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2483831)

They manage to assemble the ingredients over heat without setting anything on fire. The end result, if not matching the picture on the website for classy looks and presentation, is definitely edible. Between the pair of them they demolish all of it while watching some French guy cook something with impressive bursts of actual flame.

*

Clint's still groggy from sleep when he heads up to the communal level at about three am. Another day, another nightmare, and his refrigerator is frustratingly bare. He'd arrange for JARVIS to set up some kind of weekly order but he's come to like the shared space and company a lot more than he'd thought he might, so he rarely eats in his own apartment.

The living room isn't empty. In fact, it's about as far from empty as it could be. He quickly pulls his hearing aids out of his pocket and shoves them in.

“Hey buddy,” Clint says.

The Hulk swings his head in Clint's direction. “Hawk,” he rumbles, quietly, for him.

The television is on with the sound down low and some guy with a very sharp knife is filleting an enormous fish. If The Hulk was watching the program, he isn't now. He's focussing on Clint like he's the only thing of interest in the room.

“You're still messed up from that gas attack in Queens, aren't you?” Clint asks. The Hulk is here but there's no damage that he can see besides an overturned lamp and a big dent in the sofa that was probably due to unexpected transformation rather than smashing. Smashing tended to be a bit more dramatic and result in major structural damage. 

The Hulk shrugs. He ducks his head and scrubs a hand through his hair. It's a gesture that's just so classically Bruce that it makes Clint smile.

“You hungry?” Clint asks. “I was just gonna make myself a sandwich, but since you're here, I could make something for both of us.”

“Yes. Hungry. Please,” The Hulk says.

“Got any requests?” Clint says, opening the refrigerator and the cupboards.

“Pancakes,” The Hulk says immediately. His eyes are a deep, muddy hazel and he's watching Clint intently.

“You got it,” Clint says. He pulls out flour, milk, eggs and sugar, and the biggest mixing bowl he can find. “You want fruit in the mix, or on the side?”

“Both,” The Hulk says.

Clint digs through the freezer and the fruit bowl and comes up with a few packets of frozen berries and a bunch of bananas that are just the right side of ripe for mashing up and mixing in the batter.

He's gotten better at this, since he started. He's learned the best way to get the mix to come together, the right size spoonful to dollop into the hot pan to get it to cook through without burning. He plays around, making different blobby shapes, talking the whole while, the way he would were it Bruce standing behind him, not The Hulk. 

“Hey, I'm not sure exactly how you're gonna eat these, since we don't have Hulk cutlery,” Clint says apologetically, as he stacks the cooked pancakes on a platter. He takes off the lid of the maple syrup. “Say when,” he says and pours.

“When,” The Hulk rumbles.

“I guess finger food could work but you're gonna get sticky,” Clint says, tipping out a bunch of the leftover fruit onto the plate and sliding it across the counter.

The Hulk looks at the plate for a moment then lifts it up to his open mouth and tilts it. The pancakes and fruit slide neatly in as though he's just eaten an oyster from the shell.

  
  
Pancakes  
Art by kath_ballantyne. [Click HERE to leave her kudos!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2483831)

“Huh, good thinking,” Clint says, genuinely impressed. “Want a refill?”

“Yes,” The Hulk says, dragging one enormous finger across the plate's surface before sucking the syrup from it.

“Okay, more hot cakes coming up,” Clint says. “Hey, there's chocolate chips in here. You want chocolate chips?”

The Hulk gives a gigantic, predatory grin which might have been terrifying had he not been in the middle of licking the last of the syrup from his plate.

“I'll take that as a yes,” Clint says. He dumps the sack of chips into the batter and whisks it through.

Making batch after batch of pancakes for The Hulk while the sky outside is lightening to dove grey might be unusual but it's kind of meditative and soothing and it's better than trying to sleep in the wake of his nightmares would have been.

Halfway into batch four, The Hulk gives a resonant sigh. 

“You okay, Big Guy?” Clint asks and turns to face him.

“Bruce,” The Hulk says, his voice lighter than usual.

Clint gets around the counter just in time to catch Bruce and stop him falling on his face.

“Welcome back,” Clint says as Bruce buries his face his Clint's shoulder and nuzzles a bit. It's adorable.

“Hurt anyone?” Bruce mumbles.

“Just about two dozen pancakes,” Clint says. “Oops, burning, hold on.”

He props Bruce against the counter then dashes in to save the pancake in the pan. It's a little crispy round the edges but it's still edible. He flips it out onto the plate then turns the burner off.

“You made pancakes?” Bruce says. He's still groggy but he's managed to lever himself onto a bar stool and he's viewing the carnage of banana peels, chocolate and berry packets, dustings of flour and drips of batter with something like amusement. Bruce trails a fingertip across a syrupy plate and sticks it in his mouth and Clint laughs.

“Yeah, it seemed like the thing to do,” Clint says. “Want some?”

“Please,” Bruce says.

“There's only syrup left. The fruit was the first thing to go,” Clint warns as he divides the remaining pancakes onto two plates.

“Syrup's fine,” Bruce says, leaning his head against one broad palm, his fingers nesting in his curls. “You're not afraid of him, are you?”

“Nope,” Clint says, digging through a drawer for a clean knife and fork.

“You should be,” Bruce says, but a half-smile is curving on his face.

“Probably,” Clint says and smiles back. “Say when.”

“When,” Bruce says.

 **Natasha**  
Natasha texts Clint when she's already in the elevator. _You'd better still be at Stark Tower, or else. >:(_

When the doors open, Clint is standing on the other side of them, an eyebrow raised. “Or else, frowny face?” he asks.

“You know what else,” Natasha says. “You look good,” she says and it's true. Clint's lost that haggard look he'd had when she'd found him in Mesquite. She knew it was a fifty-fifty chance that he'd run, but she's happy he didn't. She tugs him into a rare hug.

When she pulls back, Clint's expression is surprised but pleased. “So do you,” he says. “Come on, we're having lunch.”

'We' seems to include himself, Banner and Steve, who's currently taking an enormous bite of a burrito. He makes a little noise and waves a finger.

“Hi,” Natasha says back, smirking. “Well, this all looks terribly domestic. No Thor?”

“In London,” Steve says.

“Booty call,” Clint clarifies.

“Stark?”

“Took a plate and left already, said his creative juices were flowing,” Clint says, pulling an ick face.

Natasha wrinkles her nose and Banner chuckles.

“Help yourself, there's plenty,” Clint says, so Natasha does.

“So, how's the journey of self-discovery?” Steve asks when she's settled down with a plate.

“It's going,” she says, tilting her hand back and forth. “How's your mission?”

Steve winces. “Slow. Complicated. But this isn't a bad place for a breather,” he says, looking out across the room to the city. “If you're planning on staying a while, that is.”

“You know, I might,” says Natasha, taking a carefully considered bite.

*

The gym is quiet when Natasha strolls in. Steve prefers to run when the weather is clement and Clint's a night owl so he tends to work out in the mid-morning when he's not constrained by regs or time tables. It's quiet, but she's not alone. Bruce is sitting in the centre of a large mat, breathing deep and slow. When he opens his eyes, they're green.

“Hi,” he says. 

His smile is welcoming even if the blatant warning sign of an impending transformation is not.

Natasha doesn't reply. She stands stock still and _thinks_ , thinks about exits, about strategies, about the potential for destruction with Bruce so close to the heart of Tony's pinnacle of narcissism in this very crowded city.

“I'm not going to change,” Bruce reassures her, his voice calm.

“You sure about that?” Natasha asks.

“Yes,” Bruce says. “I've been doing this pretty much every morning for the last five years.”

“Trying to tame the monster?” she asks.

“Talking, mostly,” Bruce says. The answer startles her. “You don't believe me.”

“I guess I'm just curious as to what you'd talk about,” Natasha says. “Or how you'd talk in the first place.”

“You're thinking about this in the wrong way,” Bruce says. “Don't worry, most people do.”

“What's the right way?” Natasha can't help but ask.

“You're thinking of our situation as a switch with two positions,” Bruce says, “when you should be thinking of it as a time share. Or as a car, with two people in it, who can both drive it if they want. But even that's clumsy. Probably a better metaphor would be a computer. It's easiest for one person to use a computer on their own but there's no reason someone else can't be reading over your shoulder, or even hitting the odd key now and again.”

“Or talking to you about what's on the screen.” Natasha says.

“Exactly,” Bruce says.

“In India, when you said the Other Guy might say no, you meant that literally,” Natasha says. “He was there the whole time, listening to what I was saying, watching it all play out.”

“Now you're getting it,” Bruce says and relaxes even further. His skin takes on a subtle green hue. “He always is. He has to be. If he's going to jump in to protect me, he likes to see them coming.”

  
  
Just talking  
Art by kath_ballantyne. [Click HERE to leave her kudos!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2483831)

“Them?”

“Ross. Chitauri. SHIELD. You. Me, sometimes,” Bruce admits and Natasha remembers, _I got low. I didn't see an end, so I put a bullet in my mouth and the Other Guy spit it out._ “Sometimes, it's something like a fall, or an explosion. Most times, though, it's people.” His lip curls and he huffs out a deep puff of air that sounds far to loud to have come from his body. A moment later, though, his face has calmed and his skin pinks again. “It's almost always people.”

“People don't like being afraid,” Natasha says.

“You don't,” Bruce says. “You've made it your life's work to be the hunter, not the hunted, and I present something of an obstacle to that. And for what it's worth, I'm sorry.”

He gets up slowly, careful, she thinks, not to spook her. By the time he steps forward to stand in front of her, his eyes have shifted back to a clear and unadulterated brown.

“Not your problem,” Natasha says. “It's mine.”

Bruce nods and walks away. When he gets to the door, he stops with a hand on the frame. “If you were going to pick one thing to be afraid of,” he says, “the Other Guy's probably a sensible choice.”

He gives her one more crooked smile, then leaves. 

Natasha takes a few moments to breathe then begins her warm-up. If she's still shaking on the inside by the time she's begun to sweat, then nobody else knows about it, and Bruce, when it comes down to it, is right. If she's going to be afraid of something, The Hulk isn't a bad place to start.

 **Tony**  
“Hey, Big Guy,” Tony says, strolling into Bruce's lab, all confidence and flash. “Got some new toys down on eighty-five. Wanna come play?”

Bruce looks up from the actual paper and ink book he's reading. “Is it urgent?”

“Well, yes, because they're _awesome_ ,” Tony explains, gesticulating to try and convey the breadth of their awesomeness. Bruce pinches the bridge of his nose. “What?”

“I'm kinda busy,” Bruce says, as though the explanation is being pulled from him against his will.

“Oh,” Tony says, deflating.

“And I don't think I'm up for people, today,” Bruce admits.

“Is this a Code Green situation? You don't look green,” Tony says, getting up in Bruce's space and peering closely.

“Not really, I'm just... tired,” Bruce says. “Don't you ever get tired? Of everything?”

Of course, Tony does. He's cultured a large collection of inappropriate and a small handful of appropriate ways of dealing with it. Being in the public eye from an early age meant that just hiding in his room and not coming out was never an option for him, though. 

“You need some you-time, I get it. We'll reschedule. How's an hour from now? Is that good for you?”

Bruce's breath huffs out and his lips curve up slightly.

“All right. Tomorrow. Next Tuesday. A month. Gimme a time frame, Banner,” Tony nags.

“Tomorrow should be fine,” Bruce says. His expression is a perfect representation of himself – a thin veneer of calmness overlaying a deeper emotional turbulence, in this case, frustration at Tony.

“Tomorrow. It's a date. I'll pick you up at two, dress casual, be prepared for mild explosions and hand wringing and wailing from OSHA. You want me out of your hair?” Tony asks. 

“Please,” Bruce says.

“Okay, I can do that,” Tony says.

He's turning for the door when his phone vibrates in his pocket.

“Huh,” he says after checking it. “Sorry, I can't. Your you-time will have to wait. We've got giant robotic octopuses climbing onshore at Battery Park.”

Bruce sighs deeply. “It's _octopodes_.”

“You getting your stretchy pants?” Tony asks.

“No, I thought I'd go nude this time. There just aren't enough pictures of The Hulk's penis on Tumblr yet,” Bruce bitches as he slips past Tony.

“You know I love it when you wear the shit I make you,” Tony calls after him. “It's like you're flashing a Property of Tony tramp stamp to the entire world.”

“That's because you put a giant Stark Industries logo on the ass,” Bruce gripes and Tony smiles.

*

  
  
Fight  
Art by kath_ballantyne. [Click HERE to leave her kudos!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2483831)

The bottom of the Hudson river is quiet and dark. There's nothing he can hear but the gurgle of water gushing in the hole ripped in his suit and nothing he can see but the faint, distant glow of daylight far above his head. The suit is completely dead, all the electrics fried by a massive EMP. He'd built in safeguards for electrical surges after Whiplash and then again after the Battle of New York (in case of accidental Thor), but the shielding's useless when the suit's too badly compromised, and this one is. Was.

Tony can feel the last few gulps of air escaping, can feel the water up to his neck and creeping inch by inch towards his face. The struggle to breathe, the distant light, the rising water, it's like a perfect storm, a greatest hits mix of some of his worst moments, and he'd like to say that faced with death he'd fought or accepted with dignity, but he can't. He's lying on the bottom of the Hudson, hyperventilating, muttering “oh, fuck, oh, fuck, oh, fuck,” while tears leak out of his eyes in a steady stream to pool in his ears.

He's taken his last breath, felt the water crawl up over his mouth and nose, and the next breath will end his life. He's going kind of giddy with the lack of oxygen, so when a tremendous force yanks him up and out, he screams in fear and inhales and chokes.

Tony feels himself slam down, feels his body being manipulated, but that's all background noise to the all encompassing, terrifying fact that he's now dying from drowning on dry land.

There's a distorted electronic bleep and the suit cracks open like a nut. Strong hands reach in and wrench it further open, drag him out to lie on the ground while he retches and vomits up vile river water. Someone's positioning him on his side, holding his head up at an angle so the water runs out onto the earth rather than back down his throat.

“Need small man,” The Hulk rumbles. Tony can feel that voice in every bit of him, through the ground itself.

The hands supporting him are huge, but even as Tony gasps and coughs, they tremble against him, shrink down. When he cracks his eyes open for the first time, it's to see Steve holding Bruce upright while he catches his breath.

Tony's seen the transformation a bunch of times now, forward and backward, but he's never seen so swift and seamless a shift from Hulk to Bruce as he's just witnessed. After a moment's vertigo, Bruce is instantly at his side, checking his vitals, asking him questions. 

“He really needs the hospital,” Bruce concludes to Steve.

“Noooo,” Tony musters the breath to moan.

“Yes,” Bruce says. “We've got a science date tomorrow and I'd be disappointed if you had to stand me up just because you keeled over in your workshop an hour from now.”

“That's sneaky,” Tony grumbles. “You didn't even want to science with me.”

“Two o'clock,” Bruce replies. “I was promised awesome.”

“I take it back, you don't deserve my name on your ass,” Tony bitches.

Nearby, he hears Clint fail to stifle a snort of laughter.

By the time the medics arrive he's able to stand and walk with assistance, but when they reach the van, they hit a snag.

“You're going to have to let go of my hand, Tony,” Bruce says.

Eventually Bruce resorts to gently detangling his fingers from Tony's own, when Tony's hand fails to obey his command to open.

“Don't leave me hanging,” Bruce says, before the doors close. “I might get angry.”

His smile is genuine but fragile at the edges like he's been through something harrowing. Tony imagines that were their situations reversed, he'd feel the same.

“Not a chance,” Tony replies, the oxygen mask echoing his words back at him.

 **The Hulk**  
“Field trip, grab your swimming trunks,” Tony cheerfully announces one morning, disrupting the lazy long breakfast taking place on the communal floor. “Be sure to pack something for the Big Guy, you'll need it,” he adds to Bruce, before stealing a slice of his French toast and flitting out again.

Bruce packs his battered bag with care; casual clothes, reading material. The Hulk's stretchy pants are neatly folded and laid on top of the rest.

Their destination is a lake miles from anywhere, far far away from New York, where the air is clear and the din of traffic is non-existent. “I kinda own it. Well, everything,” Tony says, gesturing out towards the horizon. “Not that pylon, wow, that's an eyesore, but everything else. So you can let it all hang out,” Tony says meaningfully, looking right at Bruce.

“Can't I just fish?” Bruce asks but Tony is persistent.

“I know you've got a handle on things and I know he'll love it. There's an old quarry over that hill if he wants to smash things, and besides that, this is practically the biggest swimming pool I own.”

“You hate swimming,” Bruce points out.

“Yes, but I love lying by the water, drinking cocktails and watching all the skin on show. And the Big Guy? Has a lot of skin,” he says, wiggling his eyebrows comically.

“I don't even know where to begin on all the wrong in what you just said,” Bruce says but he starts unbuttoning his shirt anyway.

The transformation is smooth and relatively painless, compared to when Bruce fights. The Hulk takes control standing on the shore, soft brown mud oozing up between his toes. He roars, just because he can, and the windows behind him rattle as it booms around the valley.

“There you go,” Tony says when the sound has died completely. “Playtime. Be back by dark, and don't fall into any old wells or abandoned mine shafts.”

Clint cracks up laughing and Steve groans Tony's name.

“What? That's good advice, isn't it?” Tony protests.

Whatever happens next between the team, The Hulk doesn't hear it, because he's off and running, powering down the shore and through the shallows. He chases geese for a little while, swipes out at them without any intention of catching them, but it's a fun game while it lasts. The lake is deep enough in the middle that he can fully immerse himself, and so he does.

  
  
Chasing geese  
Art by kath_ballantyne. [Click HERE to leave her kudos!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2483831)

The quarry is indeed a perfect smashing playground. There is rubble aplenty, large cut chunks of stone that even he struggles to lift, and a tall, sheer cliff face to throw everything against. 

  
  
Throwing rocks.  
Art by kath_ballantyne. [Click HERE to leave her kudos!](http://archiveofourown.org/works/2483831)

By the time the sun is sinking, the landscape of the quarry has completely changed and he has to jump in the lake again to clean the grit from his skin.

Tony's waiting on the pier for him with a towel draped across one arm when he emerges.

“Have fun?” Tony asks, a knowing smile curving on his lips.

The Hulk grins. 

“Awesome,” Tony says. “Now, as much as I adore you, Jolly Green, you're going to have to let Bruce come back out. This is my biggest towel,” he says, “and though I'd love to rub you down, there's no way this is going to cover it. We're here all week, though, barring apocalypse, so you'll get another romp or two before we leave. Okay?”

The Hulk snorts. “Okay,” he says and steps back to let Bruce take his place.

Tony moves forward and wraps Bruce up with care, supporting him until they're back on the wide deck.

“It went all right?” Bruce asks, tentatively.

“It went great,” Tony assures him. “He let off a bunch of steam, seemed to have a blast. I'm thinking if he gets some time day after tomorrow, he'll be more inclined to just hang out with the rest of us. Chill, you know?”

“I don't think he's really a chilling kinda guy,” Bruce says.

“Well, whatever,” Tony says. “He's allowed to cut loose here, you both are.”

Bruce isn't sure of the wisdom of that but he just nods, lets Tony lead him inside where it's light, where there's music playing. Steve and Thor are playing video games. Clint is flipping burgers and the smell is utterly divine. Natasha has a smile, just for him. She looks a little windswept; Bruce is sure The Hulk caught sight of her, now and again, through the trees. He supposes The Hulk didn't mind the shadow since she's sitting there, relaxed and laughing, as Steve's little cart on screen spins out again.

“Mother and country,” Steve bitches and Natasha just laughs louder.

“Grub's up,” Clint yells and there's a bit of a stampede for food, controllers abandoned, good-natured elbowing to get in first.

“Hey, Bruce,” Clint says, passing over a large dish with five burgers already assembled on it. “You guys burned a lot of fuel today, knew you'd be starving. Eat up.”

Steve kicks out a stool from the counter and Bruce sits. He lets the flavour of beef and onions fill his mouth and the din of playful bickering ebb and flow around him.

 _Like it here_ , The Hulk says clearly in his ear. _Like them_ , he adds.

 _Yeah, me too_ , Bruce replies.

The warmth of their mutual affection wraps around him like a blanket.

When he goes to take his next bite, he realises he's smiling.

*

**Author's Note:**

>  **Afterword on Bruce, the Hulk and Multiplicity**  
>  I read pretty widely but one thing I own a lot of are auto/biographies of multiple personalities/multiple systems. Multiple systems in real life vary widely as to how much co-consciousness takes place (two or more members witnessing events or sharing experiences simultaneously), shared memories (able to be accessed by two or more members), how much co-running/co-fronting happens (two or more members actually using the body at the same time), and what their internal landscape looks like and how it works. 
> 
> There's a lot in wider canon supporting the idea that Bruce and The Hulk are essentially a two-member multiple system. Given Bruce's childhood, it's likely that their system is a trauma-split, or if they _were_ born multiple, that their system was disordered by abuse. Their co-consciousness varies, as does the awareness and memory between shifts, but all these things seem to vastly improve from The Incredible Hulk to The Avengers. I think that this is because Bruce stops blindly fighting The Hulk and starts to accept him, as suggested by the end of The Incredible Hulk. This is in keeping with what many multiples report – when their systems are more balanced, when a form of communication is established, when members get the front time they need and efforts are made to accommodate everyone, switching is smoother and less traumatic and it's easier to retain useful information from one frontrunner switching to the next. The Calcutta scene in The Avengers is the best argument for internal communication between them. Though Bruce is clearly doing most of the talking, he's speaking inclusively, as if The Hulk is right beside him and has an independent opinion that needs to be considered. That's a big change from The Incredible Hulk, where Bruce refers to The Hulk as 'it' and uses disease metaphors throughout.
> 
> In this story The Hulk starts out as a protective figure, lies dormant for many years, and then is brought out by the gamma experiment, but I should state that his role as a protector is not the entirety of who he is. The persistence of the idea of a protector member (whose sole task is to protect the system) is pervasive in many published accounts, but it isn't something that all systems have, or even if they do, a protector is often simply a member more able to handle difficult or dangerous situations a system may face, and is therefore called to front at those times. 
> 
> While I am certain I have seeded this story with many other tropes, I think given that Bruce and The Hulk's story is based on literary themes of duality (like Jekyll and Hyde) rather than actual multiple experience, these clichés were inevitable without rewriting their characters and history, and so, with regret, I admit I have perpetuated those myths. I hope, for those of you reading for whom multiplicity is a reality, that I have put in enough shades of grey to excuse the black and white.


End file.
